Catching the Rain
When you pay for your water, you garden, you are in a drought, and the water company is requesting a large rate increase, a rainwater collection system is suddenly very appealing. Our collection system involves collecting the rain water that falls on the roof of our house. It uses the existing gutter and down spouting system. You really can't tell that we are doing anything different by just looking at the house.
The down spouting then runs into PVC pipe and then to the tank. Our pipe is buried, but I have seen systems that simply attached the pipe around the foundation of the house. In my opinion, having PVC wrapped around your house is not all that attractive, but it does save you from digging up your yard. The PVC runs to the tank and fills from the top. The other PVC is the overflow pipe for when the tank is full. We've talked about creating a small duck pond at the end of this pipe.
Our tank is about 2000 gallons. Probably more than we need, but this is a tank that we already had. It is what we used before we had water lines to our house. No, it is not exactly attractive either, but it is out of the main view of the house, tucked in some trees by the rabbit hutches. We don't have neighbors, so who is going to complain? A small building is also planned for the area in front of the hutches. That will help hide the tank even more.
Does it work? I tried to find how much rain we've gotten in the past few days. According to one source, it has been less than 1/4 an inch. It seems to me that we have gotten more than that, but I don't have a rain gauge up. Let's be generous and say we've gotten double that; an 1/2 inch. From those rains we have collected over four hundred gallons of water.
Our system is not yet complete. A small pump still needs to be added. That will enable us to easily get the water up to the garden. Currently the water would have to be hauled by bucket to the garden. We may use the water for more than just the garden too. I'm thinking of it for the animals, the kid's sprinkler, and I'm wondering if I could finagle the hose up to the washer for laundry.
Rain water collection will help us save money. It is also good for the environment. It is a win-win situation!
green, 
sustainability, 
frugal
Frugal Fridays at Biblical Womanhood
7 comments:
All I can keep thinking is that here in arizona the water will evaporate to quick; plus we usually don't get that much rain out here in the desert :)
Well unless we are in a monsoon season.
Wonderful green idea! This summer in Texas, we've had an incredible amount of rain, but that is not the norm, so a system like this would be very handy.
On another blog a few months ago, I think it was Crunchy Chicken's blog, I saw a post for rain barrels you can buy on Amazon. One of them was very inexpensive and was made to look like a barrel. It was meant to blend into a garden. Could be great for a little city garden if you want to save a bit of money. I might get one....it attaches to your down spout. I've also seen people use those rain chains to catch the water because they are decorative.
That's a wonderful system you have there! Do they have wells where you are? My grandparents's used well water in Pa.
Alexandra,
Before we had this done we just had old barrels to catch the rain from the spouting. Not very attractive. The ones you mention do sound perfect for they city; functional but pretty too!
No there are very few wells here. We actually have city water and I believe it is available to the whole county. Before that I think most people had cisterns. Before we hooked into the water line we had our water hauled in. Some still do that because they don't want to pay for the water line.
I would add only 1/2 of teaspoon to that tank,that would help with the mold,algie and bacteria,here,I add 6 eye drops to 1000 gallons because its drinken water and it dosent set too lond because its being hauled for drinken water.sence that water is just setten and not being serculated and so on,a 1/2 teaspoon should do it.
Tamela answered my nagging question. I'm guessing she is talking about bleach?
Very, very creative Stephanie and family. Nice job!
Yes bleach. I can use it as is for the garden, but for other uses I would need to treat with bleach to kill the algae and what not.
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